Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ descent into madness ❯ chapter 2 ( Chapter 2 )

Descent into Madness
Chapter Two

"Good morning, slugs," Manx growled dangerously, bobs of curly red hair bouncing above her shoulders.

Ken blinked. This was not the usual morning greeting they received. Beside him, Sakura covered her mouth and tittered. He wondered, briefly, what she found so funny, but then remembered that males were not given the privilege of understanding why any female of their species did the things they did.

In the meantime Manx paused, glaring around menacingly at the reporters gathered around her. Men shuffled their feet awkwardly and glanced at their watches; women looked anywhere except at the irate redhead.

"The boss has been on my case lately, asking why the quality of our articles has dropped." She took a deep breath at this, as if having to state such an untruth hurt so much it made her chest contract. "I said I would look into the matter, and here I am now... asking you slugs why ... you have shown ... in the past month ... a complete inability to write!" Another haggard breath. "And you're writers! You're paid to write!"

"... Well, you see, Miss Manx," began one reporter, but Manx wasn't having any of it.

"If money isn't a good enough incentive to write, what is? Should I be threatening to slaughter you all?!"

"No, miss," the congregated reporters chorused back obediently, like students in a class with a vicious teacher.

Manx glared round one more time just to make sure, and then stepped back, waving her hand at them dismissively and sighing. "All right, all right, relax. I just got a new assignment in from the editor ... relatively long-term two-part article on Redleaf Asylum, it's out nearer the coast. Any of you want to volunteer for it?"

"Excuse me, miss, perhaps Bernard and I --" a blonde woman by the side started timidly.

"Don't even think about it," Manx growled, again. "Bernard and you this, Bernard and you that, don't talk to me until you've got a date for the marriage fixed." The blonde woman blushed, and a man standing beside her put an arm around her shoulders. The rest of the reporters snickered, but were glared into silence again.

"Well?"

"Miss Manx!" Sakura's voice pierced Ken's eardrums, and shook him out of his I-wish-I-was-somewhere-else stupor. "Miss Manx, Ken and I would be happy to volunteer for an assignment as such!"

Manx's piercing gaze fell upon the pair as if considering whether they were up to such a demanding task; Sakura was smiling in a way she must have thought looked hopeful, and Ken simply blinked, trying to remember what he was being stared at for.

"... Very well," Manx finally allowed, and turned around to retrieve a single manila folder from within the rows of files on her shelves. This was tossed out onto her desk, the look shot towards Sakura reading 'take it'. "That's all the info you'll need; it's the usual 'how I felt while I was surrounded by lunatics on all sides'. Any questions, come to me. Right, dismissed."

The rest of the reporters filed out with the elated expressions of children who had been accused of stealing from the cookie jar but acquitted. Sakura, after grabbing the folder, flashed Ken a brilliant smile and then followed suit of the crowd, glancing back as if to say 'Aren't you coming?'

Ken, however, had something else to do.

"Miss Manx...?"

"Just Manx, dear, 'Miss Manx' is to scare the rookies," Manx called back over her shoulder with an indulgent grin, neatening the files which had been shoved out of place for her to find that single elusive folder.

"Right. Manx." It felt odd for him, calling her that. "I was just wondering if --"

"If?"

"If Sakura and I were really a --"

"A good choice for this assignment?"

Ken had never known Manx was psychic.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Well, you get along well enough, don't you?"

"Yes, but --"

"And you both do things professionally, don't you?"

"What I meant was that --"

"Hell, you're engaged, aren't you?"

"I was just trying to say --"

"I mean, you love each other, don't you?"

And Ken had nothing left to say to that.

"I still don't see why we can't take your car," Ken grumbled, shutting the driver's side door and starting up the car. He drummed fingers on the steering wheel while CDs clicked and changed in the boot, waiting for the music to come on. And it did, after moments more of clicking and static.

Sakura slid into the passenger's seat and buckled up, frowning over at Ken in protest at the synthesizer's tones booming over the car's speakers. "And I don't see why we can't listen to more recent music. When did this song come out, 1966?"

Ken laughed, steering out of the parking lot and driving out onto the road. "Only about a decade and a half ago! And don't diss this song, it's classic!"

I wanted to be with you alone
And talk about the weather

"It sounds like a bunch of old men in pain."

But traditions I can trace against the child in your face
Won't escape my attention

"It's classic!"

You keep your distance with a system of touch
And gentle persuasion

"Come on, Ken, something more recent, pleeeease?"

I'm lost in admiration, could I need you this much?
Oh, you're wasting my time
You're just, just, just wasting time

"Well ..." The brunette took his eyes off the road for a second to look at his fiancée. She stared back, cherry-hued eyes wide and hopeful.

Something happens and I'm head over heels, I didn't find out 'til I was ...

"All right, all right," Ken relented, reaching over to switch from CDs to tuner, while Sakura did a victorious little half-dance. More static buzzed until it finally fixed itself on a station, and Ken resigned himself to a constant feed of bad pop songs for the rest of the journey towards Redleaf Asylum. Hell, he thought, they might even have to keep me there after a few hours of listening to this rubbish! Sakura herself was oblivious, though, and her jigging, bopping, and improvised vocals served to at least put a small smile on her fiancé's face.

After a few wrong turn-offs and backtracking, they finally found their way to Redleaf Asylum. It wasn't an entirely imposing building; in fact it looked rather cozy and welcoming minus the barbed wire fence and security, but that was until you remembered what it housed inside. The sign outside simply read Redleaf, sort of like a museum or a very large cafe.

Ken parked the car once they'd gotten past the fussy guard at the front, and followed the still-bopping and still singing Sakura up to the doors.

"I'm moving, I'm coming! Can you hear what I hear? It's calling you, my dear --"

"Mr. Hidaka, Miss Tomoe, I presume?" Sakura's singing was interrupted by what looked like a nurse, clad in a prim and spotless white dress. A pretty nurse. Ken stared for a second, until he remembered who he was with and swallowed nervously, producing a smile.

"Yes, miss. We've come to do an --"

"No need to explain. Please, do come in. And put these on." Birman stepped aside after handing the pair two 'visitor' badges, allowing them to enter the hallowed hallways of her workplace.

"Now," she began briskly, starting off down the corridor without looking back to see if they were following. Of course, they had no choice, and had soon fallen in step behind her -- Sakura taking in every word, Ken feeling rather lost and out of place. "I expect you have already decided who will be interviewing head of security on your next visit? I will be escorting you both on a short tour of Redleaf today."

Ken, who was busy trying to figure out how to pin the badge on his shirt, did not notice the anxious look Sakura shot him. Perhaps she thought they were starting off on the wrong foot, as of course nothing of the sort had been decided.. "I - I will be interviewing him."

"Her," Birman correctly abruptly, and Sakura blushed scarlet. Ignoring the faux pas, the nurse steered them both onto the next corridor. By now Ken was so disoriented he had given up trying to remember the way back out, and simply followed.

"This," continued Birman, in a no-nonsense manner, "is the corridor containing some of our more violent patients." They passed room after room, door after door, some with windows and some without -- although after two windows Sakura stopped looking. Ken continued glancing in to satisfy his curiosity; some contained men in strait jackets, giggling in a corner of their padded room; some contained a bed with a figure strapped down on it, thrashing wildly; and some... some contained men that were, for all appearances, completely normal.

Ken shuddered, at one that particularly resembled his next-door neighbor. He made a mental note to be kinder to the old man the next time he saw him.

And so it went, with corridor after identical white corridor, with Birman occasionally pausing to point out certain security features or staff facilities.

"That's the staff canteen," she nodded one time at a low-built building on the ground, through a small window in one side of yet another hallway. "The food's not wonderful, but it's edible."

"May we see it?" asked Sakura, a little hesitantly.

"Staff-only," Birman added, with a particularly stern look back at the rose-eyed girl.

Sakura flushed again and mumbled an abashed apology.

Now, they had reached the corridor which house the "primarily delusional patients", according to the nurse. Here there was not a line of doors with windows in them, but cells with one side transparent, perhaps plastic or Plexiglas. The rooms boasted nothing but a bed and the patient himself; however, Ken decided they were better off than those in the padded cells -- at least they were allowed some form of free movement.

A few of the patients came forward to peer at them cluelessly from behind the Plexiglas, while most simply ignored Birman and the visitors, continuing their animated conversations with no one.

And then Ken noticed the eyes fixed right on him.

No ... no, they weren't directly on him. They flickered; sometimes shifting sideways in Sakura's direction, sometimes seeming to roll aimlessly in their sockets. The effect was mildly disturbing, and Ken shuddered as the gaze settled on him again.

But it wasn't that someone was simply staring at him that caught his attention, it was the intensity of the stare. The way those eyes burned themselves into his mind. They were lost, those eyes; lost in a sea of sorrow and pain in this endless, white hell. And yet, ...

Yet ...

They had more direction than Ken thought he could ever have.

He stepped forward.

"Sir?"

Right at the end of the hall were the blazing, alluring eyes, and that was where Ken moved towards, soon followed by the nurse (irritated that he would dare walk without her permission) and a flustered Sakura.

"Sir, I don't think you should be proceeding without my guidance, it could be dangerous if you ..."

Ken wasn't listening. He was staring -- bravely meeting the cool amethyst gaze that had trapped his the moment their eyes had met.

"Miss, who's... who's that?" asked Ken. Dimly he realized Sakura had elbowed him in the side for being rude or irrelevant, and he decided he didn't really care.

"That?" Birman replied haughtily. "That is a certain Mr. Fujimiya; Ran Fujimiya, to be exact. But I do not see how this information relates to your assignment; now if you don't mind I would like to show you the ... "

Ken wasn't listening to the nurse anymore, as he allowed himself to be lead away, and out of the hallway. All he could see -- all he wanted to see were those violet eyes, that redheaded man ...

Birman stared through the Plexiglas of Ran's cell, and frowned. He lay passively on the bed, slitted amethysts barely open. It was days after she had escorted that pair of writers around the asylum; rather rude they had been, too ... she couldn't distract herself from it so easily, though.

She was worried.

and he was with my sister, my sister, my sister, Aya, Aya, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, I'd never make you cry, Aya, don't cry, Aya

Perhaps it was a stage all of them went through at some point; after all, they were in an asylum, but ... she had just never expected it from him.

where are you, Aya, I'm looking for you, I'll find you, save you, Aya, they'll hurt you, I'll never, you, you're pretty

He had refused to eat on several occasions, and was spending more and more of his time simply lying on his bed, lethargic and uninterested in the activity going on outside his cell. She supposed this could be the signs of someone finally breaking, but the light was still burning in his eyes.

you're pretty

She worried, and she wondered.

you're pretty when you cry

He tutted as Birman shut the door behind the dazed-looking redhead, shaking his head and staring down at the television screens. Instead of pacing the room like he usually would, Aya simply sat down on a chair and stared at nothing.

"I'm telling you, Miss Birman, you gotta watch out for that one."

"Oh?" The nurse's tone was a mix of warning and indulgent. "And why's that?"

"He's got creepy eyes. The way he stares at you... I'm telling you, Miss, you really ought to --"

"I will not have one of my patients degraded in such a fashion!" Hands on her hips, she turned to Youji and frowned deep and disapprovingly. "Mind your manners, Mr. Kudou!"

He gaped for a second, and then backed down, holding his hands up in defense. "Hey, hey, hey! I was just saying ..."

"Yes, and you have said quite enough. Good day."

The click of Birman's heels on the polished floor echoed about the corridor. Youji disbelievingly watched her leave, and was left to grumble his complaints about the fairer sex to no one.

"Quit changing the channel!"

"I'm not going to stop bothering you until you tell me what that was all about!" Sakura, sitting by the side of the TV, glared holes into the back of her fiancé's head as he dug around for the remote under the couch cushions.

"What what was all about?"

"You know what I'm talking about, Ken Hidaka! It isn't as if we have any other assignments to work on together!"

"What about our assignment?"

"When you -- when you went and stared at that man for only about ten minutes! What's gotten into you?"

"What's gotten into you? Why does it matter so much? He just freaked me out, okay? He was scary. That's all."

"Are you sure?"

Ken simply looked at her, and her features softened slightly in apology.

"Look, Ken ... I'm... I'm just worried about you, okay? Don't scare me like that next time... I thought you were..."

Abruptly they both smiled at each other, and Ken coughed awkwardly, looking away.

"Yeah, well. Have a little more faith in me, all right? I'm not gonna go psycho on you, I can promise you that much."

"... Ken, I..." Suddenly, Sakura sprung up from where she sat, dashing over to wind arms around Ken's neck and plant a kiss on him. "I'm sorry. I'll go wash up now, okay? ... I'm sorry."

"It's okay." His smile was a little more forced this time, gently stroking the girl's back. She nuzzled him, and then darted off again. Tracing her by her footsteps, he heard Sakura walking through the bedroom to the bathroom, and then the door shutting.

Sighing, Ken fell back against the couch, and frowned at the flickering screen.

"Big game tonight; the Philadelphia seventy-sixers versus the Los Angeles Lakers! Just look at the crowd, folks, it's --"

He switched off the TV.

Quite suddenly, he had lost his interest in watching the game.